WHEN JOHN Adams said that the vice presidency was "the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived," he was not talking about the same institution that Dick Cheney inhabits today. The current vice president is one of the most influential players in the Bush White House and has served as the principal motor behind many of this administration's most poorly advised, secretive and cronyistic policies.
Rarely in our history has the nation's choice of vice president mattered so much to the course of our nation, apart from the mechanics of presidential succession. Throughout the campaign, Cheney has contrasted hugely with the Democratic nominee for vice president, Sen. John Edwards. And while many see it as merely a stylistic difference, the two embody two starkly divergent approaches to the vice presidency, and judging from Dick Cheney's first-term record, the nation would be better off with John Edwards as vice president.
Voters have a very definite choice in the running mates next month. While the bottom of the ticket is never as important as the top, this year the vice president has rightfully become its own issue that, in a close race, could tip the scales.
The presence of Dick Cheney on the ticket ensures that a second Bush administration would continue the poor judgment, secrecy and corporate favoritism that stand as Vice President Cheney's greatest legacy. Since taking office in January 2001, President Bush has relied heavily upon his second-in-command. Bush has so crutched himself on Cheney that many have compared them to a pupil and a tutor. Cheney's clout within the White House has turned the vice president's office into a free-floating power mass and given the vice president a monumental role in decision-making. As Newsweek reported on Nov. 19, 2003, during the run-up to the Iraq war, Cheney had "in effect created a parallel government that became the real power center."
There is nothing inherently wrong with this vision of the vice presidency, but handing that role to Dick Cheney is a major mistake. Starting in 2002 (and even before), Cheney actively agitated for war in Iraq. He instructed his staff to monitor the intelligence apparatus, giving Cheney a whole slew of dubious data to spout on television that the public now knows to be false (for instance, his claim that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear program). As head of the National Energy Policy Development Group during his term, Cheney, a former Halliburton CEO, took advice from members of the private sector, but has refused to reveal those who attended the task force's closed-door meetings. Halliburton has also received billions of dollars worth of no-bid contracts to help reconstruct Iraq (though no one can prove exactly how much Cheney influenced that decision).
The vice president presents a track record that gives voters a clear idea of what he would do with the office for four more years: continue wielding vast influence over an administration that is already worse for his presence. John Edwards, on the other hand, presents a different -- and in this election year, altogether more appropriate -- idea of what the vice president should do and how he should relate to the American people. It is rather clear that a Vice President Edwards would never even ask for the kind of policy influence that Vice President Cheney has so misused. In Tuesday's vice-presidential debate and on the campaign trail, Edwards has taken stands against Cheney's deceptions preceding the war in Iraq, as well as the secrecy that has been typified by the energy task force and the giveaways to the vice president's former company. As vice president, Edwards would take a much less obtrusive role and would never resort to executing his official duties with unknown people in undisclosed locations, like Cheney has.
The differences between the candidates stood in relief in Tuesday's debate. On repeated occasions Cheney has also lied about what he has said in the past, most notably about whether he misled the American people about the threats Iraq posed before the American invasion, bafflingly claiming, "I have not suggested there is a connection between Iraq and 9/11." In fact, Cheney has suggested it multiple times and even refused to dismiss the possibility after the 9/11 Commission did with finality. Edwards did not point out all Cheney's deceptions, but he made it clear that as vice president, he would leave any business ties behind, make decisions with solid evidence, come clean if it was proven false and seek to tell Americans the truth.
Indeed, the only argument Republicans seem to muster for Cheney is that he has the resumé of a second-string president. But to buy that premise ignores the fact that as vice president for the past four years, Cheney's main job has not been to sit around waiting for Bush's incapacitation -- it has been to design Bush's worst decisions. President Bush takes pride in his trust for those who advise him, and on Nov. 2, one of his worst advisers will appear with him on the ballot. After Tuesday's debate, it is clear that Americans have an important choice to make in number-twos. It is even clearer that Americans cannot choose more of the same.
Michael Slaven's column appears Thursdays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at mslaven@cavalierdaily.com.
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